Mike Takes the Road
Episode V: Mike Takes the Road was uploaded on September 18, 2013 and is the fifth episode of the first season. Plot The Arlesdale Railway is quite well known for it's extremely small, but still useful engines, it is a massive tourist attraction and many came to see the beautiful Arlesdale countryside. One morning, Frank complains about the amount of work, asking if it is a production line, Bert and Jock tell him that he only works 5 hours a day, while they work for 10 hours, Rex tells them all to stop arguing because it's a lovely day, The Blisters then pass with the Breakdown Train and Mike tells them that they don't need to talk at the same time, but they just respond with "We wouldn't be identical if we didn't". Mike likes working in the countryside because it makes him feel jolly inside, but his mood would change when he had to wait for other engines to pass, such as Frank. His favorite place is the forest, it is quiet and peaceful and he wished he could live in the trees instead of the railway, when he stopped to let passengers take photos, he asks his driver why nobody else can appreciate the forest like him, while his driver says that people have different interests, Mike then tries to respond, but a car passes him at a dangerously high speed, Mike just thinks its a drunk driver. When Mike arrived at Arlesdale, the car had crashed and the police were questioning the driver, Jock tells him that the driver came in at 80 miles per hour, Mike then says that they seem to have more freedom than Trains, while Jock says he'd rather keep his rails, because he doesn't have as many accidents, and can go where he is meant to go. Mike tells this to the other engines, and Bert says only a daft engine would try to travel on the road, Mike says he wouldn't try to, he just thinks it would be more efficient, Rex simply responds with "Well, it's not worth trying". Next morning, Mike was steaming up for his train when Duck came with his ballast trucks, he points out that he looks cheerful, Mike then says he is, and asks Duck if he ever wanted to just fly off the rails and move gracefully without a care, Duck says he hasn't, and asks him if he has. Mike then says that he thinks that road travel is much more efficient and travelling on rail as one of the Blisters prepare Duck's ballast, he also says that Bertie & Terrence had given him and idea of that but he wanted to see it for himself, Frank hears this and asks Mike if he is daft and that he makes him chuckle, Mike then leaves for his train leaving Duck to tell Mike not to do anything stupid. Mike soon forgot about his desire for road travel, it was very busy that day and he worked hard all day, he was eventually on his last run back to Arlesdale, he was always anxious to get home before dark because of bad experiences with the dark due to the fact that he doesn't have a headlight, such as crashing into Frank while trying to find a farmer's lamb. Not too far down the line, Jock was taking an old truck filled with cement, when the truck started to leak, Jock sees this and tries to get it to it's destination as soon as possible, causing the car to shudder & shake, and midway a large wad of cement poured onto the tracks, he didn't see this and kept on going. The cement later dried up, and Mike was unknowingly heading straight for it, he was too busy looking at the sky to notice, and when he realized, it was too late, Mike had crashed into the cement. His driver tried to call for the breakdown train, but there was more cement on the tracks ahead, so the Blisters were unable to come with the train, so a bus was needed to take the passengers home, with Mike wondering how he should get back on the home. His driver gets the idea to have Mike travel the road, which he finds outrageous, but his driver asks if he wants to stay there for the night, so he decides to go for it, only this once though, the passengers helped him onto the road, and he was terrified, he slowly makes his way on the road, because his wheels weren't used to the road, when he had to make a turn, the workmen helped him out, eventually, he finds Donald with the breakdown train, calling him a brave wee engine. When Mike came home, the Blisters offer to assist him back to the sheds, but he decides to go on his own, Jock apologizes about the cement incident, thinking he should've gone slower, but Mike says it wasn't his fault, Bert then starts teasing him about the road, but Mike just ignored him, and told him to shut up, and said no more that night, leaving his desire for road travel at an end. Characters * Mike * Jock * Bert * Frank * Duck * Rex * Blister I and Blister II (speak at the same time) * Donald and Douglas (Donald only, Douglas mentioned) * Oliver (cameo) * Toad (cameo) * Bertie (mentioned) * Terence (mentioned) Voice Cast * EnterprisingEngine93: Mike and Frank * MallardFan62: Duck * James Riddle: Jock * Thomas1Edward2Henry3: Everyone else Transcript Main article: Mike Takes the Road/Transcript Trivia * This is the last episode until Stuck was uploaded in January 2014. * This is the first episode to feature the voice of James Riddle. * There is a reference to EnterprisingEngine93's episode Search Party. * In this episode, almost all the characters have a speaking role, making it the episode with the fewest cameos. * In one of the scripts for the pilot episode, this idea was used instead Oliver took the road instead of Mike. Plus, the trucks would have pushed him off the rails instead of hitting dried cement. * This episode's title is a reference to the Railway Series story "Toby Takes the Road" from the book "Toby, Trucks and Trouble". Category:The Engines of Sodor Category:Season 1 Category:Episodes Category:Episodes focusing on Mike Category:Arlesdale Railway Episodes